When it comes to big blockbuster tours, Arthur Fogel is the guy. The Canadian-born industry icon practically invented them. It was a big year for record-setting live music events, and other than Taylor Swift, Fogel’s fingerprints were on most of them: Beyoncé’s Renaissance Tour, U2’s now-iconic opening residency at The Sphere in Las Vegas, Madonna’s Celebration Tour and its 1.6 million-person topper in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. “For me, it was an incredible year,” Fogel says in Billboard Canada’s Q&A. “To do all of those within a year was incredibly challenging and stressful, but each of them in their own way was greatly successful.” For fellow Canadian exec, Live Nation’s CEO Michael Rapino, the year might be stressful for a different reason: the U.S. Department of Justice’s just-filed antitrust lawsuit, accusing the company of anticompetitive business practices and a proposed separation from Ticketmaster. When it comes to power, Live Nation might just be too powerful.

Major labels in Canada have a tendency to be a little bit risk-averse, betting on legacy artists or piggybacking off the success of their American counterparts. Recently, Warner Music Canada has been the exception. Since she became President in 2021, Kristen Burke has been the only female head of a major label in Canada, and it’s already been an eventful tenure. They’ve moved their headquarters into the heart of Toronto at the splashy new retail/business development The Well, which has space for content creation, recording and live music to host industry, artist and community-centric events. They’ve also launched 91 North Records, a joint venture with Warner Music India to support South Asian artists and create “a bridge between the East and West that exists to elevate artists creating culturally impactful and innovative music.” The Punjabi Wave is one of the biggest and most influential stories in Canadian music right now, and the label is at the forefront. Karan Aujla (who is signed directly to Warner Music Canada) has over 1 billion global streams with his album Making Memories and over 445 million streams and 2 billion social views with his single “Softly.” He also set a Billboard Canadian Albums chart record for a Punjabi artist and capped it off with a TikTok Fan Choice Juno Award. The bet paid off.

The Weeknd is a major hometown success story, and so is his manager. The Weeknd is arguably the biggest artist out of Canada right now, and one who continues to make Canadian chart history. Wassim “Sal” Slaiby has been with him nearly every step of the way, and also manages Canadian rappers Belly and Nav. He’s also been involved with many American chart-toppers, including Brandy, Bryson Tiller and Doja Cat. With his SALXCO company, he’s bridged the gap between Middle Eastern & North African music and North America, including Elyanna, the first singer to perform a set at Coachella entirely in Arabic. Her hit single “Ana Lahale," which boasts 23 million Spotify streams, features Lebanese-Canadian singer Massari, who is head of A&R for Universal Music Arabic where Slaiby is at the helm. He gives back through his work with Global Citizen and, though he’s living large in Los Angeles, helps spark the next generation in the often-underserved Toronto community with a role on the board of HXOUSE, the XO-led artistic incubator on the waterfront.

Debra Rathwell is the Executive Vice President of Global Touring and Talent at AEG Presents, one of the largest producers and promoters of live tours and music events in the world. Originally from Ottawa, like Fogel she’s a powerful exec working in concerts in the U.S. who came up through Canadian promotion in the ‘80s and ‘90s. She’s already had a career full of live shows doubling as cultural events like Woodstock ‘94 and ‘99 and TV shows like America’s Got Talent and So You Think You Can Dance. But the last year has been nearly as eventful. AEG Presents, its subsidiaries and partner promoters grossed $2 billion from 7,639 shows reported to Billboard Boxscore — almost twice as many as Live Nation’s 4,263. That includes the end of Elton John’s epic Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, which lasted half a decade. “It was an honor and labor of love to spend six years of my life with Elton John and all of the members of our close-knit team,” Rathwell says. “At the time of its completion, the FYBR Tour was the highest grossing tour of all time: 330 shows, 6 million tickets sold, grossing $939 million.” And through its partner Messina Touring Group, AEG has been working with Taylor Swift on her Eras Tour — which Billboard estimates grossed $906.1 million.

Canadian-Iranian powerhouse Golnar Khosrowshahi might not be a household name, but she’s quietly one of the most influential music execs coming from this country (though she now spends as much time in New York). Reservoir has a diverse publishing catalogue that accounted for 10 Grammys at the most recent ceremony, including Joni Mitchell at Newport, the Canadian folk icon’s emotional return to the stage. Reservoir was responsible for bringing seminal hip-hop group De La Soul’s much-missed catalogue to streaming and back onto the charts in 2023 after acquiring the group’s back catalogue through their 2021 acquisition of legendary independent hip-hop label Tommy Boy Music — no easy feat. “Our team worked diligently alongside De La Soul for 18 months to clear the samples, prepare the music for streaming, and orchestrate a robust release plan,” Khosrowshahi says. “It was a privilege to share De La Soul’s long-awaited music with the fans, and also cultivate a whole new generation of listeners.” Since going public two years ago, Reservoir is the first female-founded and led publicly traded independent music company. It reported 13% revenue growth in 2023 and double digit organic growth in each quarter in 2024.

With Jennifer Brown as CEO, SOCAN, the rights organization that collects and distributes publishing royalties for musicians and rights-holders, hit a major milestone in 2023: more than half a billion dollars in revenue. SOCAN makes sure that Canadian musicians and songwriters receive their share, so it is a crucial behind-the-scenes company for the most important people in music: the creators. On SOCAN and as Vice-Chair of the CISAC board of directors, Brown is an advocate for the protection and value of artists’ work. On the policy and advocacy side, Brown has been instrumental in the modernization of the Broadcasting Act to ensure digital platforms contribute to promotion of Canadian music. The result, the Online Streaming Act, could determine the future of CanCon. SOCAN is also urging the government to adopt transparency when it comes to AI and properly reward human rights-holders, another hot button issue in the industry.

It’s been a chaotic year for Hipgnosis and its Canadian founder Merck Mercuriadis. The company that has proven the investment value of song catalogues as assets has been part of a bidding war between Concord and Blackstone to take over Hipgnosis Songs Fund, for which Hipgnosis Song Management is the investment advisor. During an embattled time for the company, Mercuriadis stepped down as CEO but is now Chairman. But the bidding war has shown how valuable Hipgnosis’s boasted $3 billion worth of assets are, which includes $400 million in 2023/2024 acquisitions of song catalogues by Justin Bieber, Shakira, Dua Lipa-songwriter Tobias Jesso Jr. and more – more than 50 No. 1 songs. Hipgnosis controls 22% of songs in Spotify’s Billions Club, including big songs by Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and Nile Rodgers, and immortal hits like Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You.” Though his future might be unclear, Mercuriadis remains at the center of the music business conversation.

Funding plays an instrumental role in Canadian music, and FACTOR is one of the most significant investors in the development, financing and support of Canadian talent and companies. Meg Symsyk became FACTOR CEO in 2021, and she’s helped the industry through a tough transitional time recovering from the pandemic. She helped deliver $50 million to relief programs for the live sector and, in addition to its musician grants for live performance, recording and development, helped FACTOR introduce two new modern programs this year: Juried Sound Single/EP and Mid-Tier Envelope for Music Companies. FACTOR received a boost from the Canadian government through the Canada Music Fund and will continue to advocate for Canadian creators and companies through the Online Streaming Act’s development, with a new culture at FACTOR through multiple staff additions. Symsyk had a couple of other big achievements this year. One, she took a “vacation” to manage and launch the book tour for Geddy Lee’s My Effin’ Life, which grossed over $3 million in ticket sales with the book hitting multiple bestseller lists. Two, as she tells Billboard Canada succinctly, “beat cancer.”

In Toronto, where fans are loyal to the local hockey team no matter how long their Stanley Cup drought lasts, MLSE holds significant prominence and power. The company, which owns the Maple Leafs and Raptors as well as a handful of other teams, is a major player in the concert scene through its ownership of Scotiabank Arena and Coca-Cola Coliseum and partnership with Live Nation. Melissa Bubb-Clarke is a senior leader overseeing programming and production in the company’s live entertainment sector, and she plays a big role in Scotiabank Arena’s status as an unmissable stop on most major artists’ North American tours, from Queen to Nas, Olivia Rodrigo to Noah Kahan. Bubb-Clarke, who also leads MLSE’s Music Sponsorship Agency, boasts record-setting show counts and revenues in a year that included a big renovation of Scotiabank Arena. Owned by the country’s two biggest telecom conglomerates, Rogers and Bell, MLSE gets some local cred for its decade-long partnership with Drake and OVO, marked by a transformation of Scotiabank Arena into “October’s Very Own Arena” for the hometown rapper’s 2023 “It’s All a Blur” tour stop. This year, Bubb-Clarke also wrapped up her tenure as a board member of CARAS, the not-for-profit behind The Juno Awards, and its music education organization MusiCounts.

France Margaret Bélanger oversees entertainment for Groupe CH, the company behind the Montreal Canadiens hockey team. Groupe CH holds a majority ownership stake in promotions companies evenko (which is also partially owned by Live Nation since 2019) and L’Équipe Spectra, which comes with a major portfolio of many of the largest live events in the country. One of the biggest and buzziest music festivals in Canada, evenko-produced Osheaga hit a record 155,000 festival-goers this past year, while the country festival LASSO Montréal doubled ticket sales to reach 65,000 in its second year in 2023. LASSO will follow it up with a potentially even bigger 2024 edition featuring many of the genre’s hot artists, including Sam Hunt and Eric Church. Bélanger is also the President of the Montreal Jazz Festival, which holds a Guinness World Record as the largest jazz festival on the planet. That’s not to mention îLESONIQ, HEAVY MTL, Les Francos de Montréal and all the big arena concerts at the Habs’ home Bell Centre.